The DeLay Rule

In what even John Podhoretz thought was an act of arrogant overreach, the House Republicans voted Wednesday to repeal the rule that kept members under indictment — as Tom DeLay may soon be — out of leadership. It was a voice vote, but Josh Marshall has been trying valiantly to get these guys on the record.

There are only a few GOP members we care about down here in the city: Peter King on Long Island, John Sweeney upstate, and, of course, our own Vito Fossella.

King told me he voted Yes on the DeLay rule, and pointed out he’d opposed it when the Republicans first introduced it to demonstrate their purity 12 years ago. “It’s a consitutional issue – the presumption of innocence,” he said.

Sweeney voted Yes on the DeLay rule, his spokesman Demetrios Karoutsos emails, in part to protect “the integrity of government from partisan attacks of a political nature.” Tom DeLay must surely appreciate that effort.